


1744

by Srna



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, timetravel au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-02
Updated: 2017-02-24
Packaged: 2018-09-21 08:16:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9539399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Srna/pseuds/Srna
Summary: Eren's family has collected all kinds of books since generations. No surprise that he feels as if he had read almost every single book that has ever been published and is craving for more. While strolling through the walls of books in his house, he suddenly finds a book he had never seen before: The diary of Levi Ackermann.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone~  
> This fic has been in my head since forever so I am glad to finally let it out. This fic will be more of slow-pace than the others because it will not be only about the relationship of Levi and Eren, but also the background story. I hope you will follow me on my way through the story :)

Eren was sweating like crazy when he got off his bike to place it in the garage. This year's summer has been incredibly hot and he was worried if he could ever drink enough to compensate his loss. He looked up at the brickwork that was covered in ivy. He lived in a big house in a small city. Well, this part belonged to a city but it was more kind of a village. Almost everyone knew everyone and there were no secrets here. Well, the only secrets people kept were their own, very dark secrets that would never leave their house. But sometimes, people hid something amazing. Like Eren, whose family owned one of the biggest private libraries in Germany. They weren't exceptionally wealthy, but his mother's family had always collected books, back to the footsteps of Gutenberg. His parents met when his father asked the family to pay a visit to their library for some research. He instantly fell for his mother and never left again ever since then. He was a remarkable doctor who had gathered a profound knowledge of the history of medicine.

  
Meanwhile, Eren was total book-maniac. He wasn't that kind of maniac who sat in their chair during lunch break and read a book. He would play football with his friends or linger around and talk about stuff, but as soon as he returned home, the smell of hundreds of years made him want to grab a new book and read it in one go. Unfortunately, there were barely any books left to read. Okay, that was half a lie. There were tons of books unread but most of them weren't stories but books about medicine, alchemy, politics, and other things Eren wasn't interested in. All he wanted were good stories but ever since he learned how to read at the age of 4, 13 years have past and hundreds of book have been read.

  
He walked into the house and got rid of his shirt which he regretted right in the next second. It was hot outside but his home was always cold. He ran up to his bathroom and jumped under the shower to get rid of all the sweat. His friends wanted to go to the pool together today but he didn't feel like it. He wasn't sure why, he just wanted to go to the library today. He hasn't started a new book in months and instead just read his favorites all over again. But he felt that today was the day he'd discover a new book to drag him into another world.

  
After he was done, he heard that someone else had entered his home, followed by a loud 'Eren? Help me carry the bags inside!'. Of course it was his mother. He jumped to his room and got dressed as fast as possible before he helped her.

  
"Why is it so hot these days? It wasn't like this. Especially our village has always been so nice and fresh throughout summer." He felt as if there was nothing else to talk about in town anymore. Everyone just talked about the heat.

  
"But you're looking good today. Did something happen?" she asked her son while putting all the things she bought into the fridge.

  
"No," he began while he picked a strawberry from the table to eat "but I feel good today. No reason though."

  
"I see." She smiled before she gave him a kiss on his hair before taking the rest to the freezer.

  
Eren grabbed some more fruits before he went back to his room again to pick up a sweater. They made sure to keep the heat as well as the cold out of the library but it'd automatically become cold after a while. It happened more than once that Eren had cought a cold because he had spent too much time in the library too lightly dressed.

  
He walked down to the other end of the building -their house was quite huge since it belonged to his mother's family since forever- to enter the library. The smell he loved so much when he entered the front door was nothing compared to the intense smell he had when he entered the library.

  
The library was organized after topics so he usually avoided the shelves he wasn't interested in but today he thought, he should look through them. Maybe someone had placed a book where it wasn't supposed to be or something would catch his eye.

  
He didn't read through all the titles. First of all, he wouldn't bother reading all of them but his height also didn't allow him to look at all of them. The room was about 3 meters high and the shelves reached up to the ceiling - he couldn't reach the top without a ladder with his 1,75 meter. The room had about 100m² so one could guess how many books they stored in here -and there was even another one.

  
Eren touched the leather binding of the very old alchemy books. He once tried to read them but except for the fact that he couldn't read such old letters, he didn't understand a single word. He was more of the arts type in school so chemistry was definitely not his favorite subject. Sciences in general weren't his favorite but since he had sworn to himself to walk through every lane, he had to include the sciences. He looked through the shelves and reached the history books. History was more of his liking. It helped him to understand some of the older stories he read and some books are really well written. In fact, they had even collected some diaries of his ancestors. He felt a bit bad about reading them. Why would you read a diary if it wasn't yours? It's incredibly personal and reading them -even if the person was dead- was a bad act.

  
When he had almost reached the end of the diary shelf, he suddenly stopped. There was a bright red book among the others which he had never seen before. There was no doubt he had never seen it before. It looked brand new among all the other old diaries, highly pigmented and standing out from the others. He touched it and was surprised how new the leather felt on his fingertips. When he looked at the title, he gulped.

  
_The Diary of Levi Ackerman_

  
Eren’s hand shivered. Levi Ackerman. Levi was the black sheep in this history of the family. About 250 years ago, Levi Ackermann, who used to be an unimportant servant for the back then still very wealthy Jäger-Family, burned a part of the library down. Only thanks to his uncle Kenny the fire could be extinguished before the worst could happen. Levi then would be sentenced to death soon after that. Already as a child, his mother had often told him about the history of the family and that Levi had to be avoided.

  
Should he read his diary? Except for the general information, he didn’t know anything about Levi. What kind of person was he? Why would he plan to burn down this very old library that held some of the last books of certain authors? What would bring a loyal servant of the family to do such a thing? He knew he never wanted to read a diary but this was a different case. He had always been curious and now was his chance to maybe get one or two answers to his questions.

  
Before he could read the first page, he felt his phone vibrating in his pocket. Armin was calling.

  
“Hey Armin, what can I do for you?” He put the diary under his armpit and walked out of the library.

  
“Are you sure you don’t want to join us today? The weather is amazing and the pool is actually quite empty!” his friend sure was energetic, even though he was just as much into reading as he was.

  
“Sounds tempting. I’ll be there in 23 minutes!” He pressed the red button on his phone and put it back into his pocket. Now that he had found the book, he didn’t feel the urge to read anymore. Did the book call him? That was definitely the craziest idea. How would a book do that? Nevertheless, he felt like he should read it tonight when no one would disturb him.

  
He placed the book under his pillow before he put is towel into his bag, switched his pants and left the house with a short ‘I’m at the pool, I’ll be home for dinner!’. He cycled all the way to the pool which was located in his village and just on point, 23 minutes later, he waved at his friends.

  
“Eren! You’re on point!” Armin said. He was always surprised how good Eren was at managing time. If Eren was ever late, it was unavoidable without a doubt.

  
“Didn’t you want to look for a new book?” his blond friend asked, hiding his upper body under a towel. It seems he had just gotten out of the pool to wait at their place for Eren.

  
“I actually found one. Even though I said I would never-”

  
“Eren! You’re finally here!” Mikasa, his childhood friend, placed herself next to him. She was the daughter of one of Eren’s mother’s best friends. They were probably just as close. “I thought you didn’t want to come today.” she said with sparkle in her eyes. When they were younger, people always thought they had something going on between them but by now, everyone knew they were just as close as brother and sister.

  
“Armin called me so I thought I couldn’t say no anymore.” He pulled his shirt over his head and got up. “Let’s go swim! I didn’t come here to sit and talk.” He said before he ran towards the pool and did a cannonball on Jean, Connie and the others.

  
He returned home after a long day. He had used sun lotion –Mikasa wouldn’t let go of him before he put some on- but his cheeks and shoulders still hurt a little.  
“Eren, Dinner is almost ready. Get changed!” his mother welcomed him. He wasn’t sure what she had decided to do for dinner tonight but it smelled like potato.

  
When he got to the dining room, he saw his father for the first time in a week. “Dad, you’re back home! How was Vienna?” he asked, placing himself in the chair next to him. His father was a doctor but he also did a lot of research. Eren didn’t know what it was exactly he was researching, but he was working in it ever since Eren could remember.

  
It was great. I brought some cake for dessert.” He said with a smile on his face. His mother came with the food and put a lot on the plates of her men before she sat down herself.

  
“Did you find something in the library today, Eren?” his mother asked. She had seen that he had carried a book with him out of the library.

  
“I did. Hey, mom, I know you don’t like talking about it too much, but could you tell me about Levi Ackermann again?”

  
His parents just stared at him as if he had just asked them to summon Lucifer himself. “Why do you want to know about Levi now?” his father asked, obviously a little upset. “There’s not much to know about this filth except for the fact that he had tried to murder your ancestors.”

  
Eren wasn’t too sure about this. He didn’t know much about him but he could never believe that Levi had done such a thing – at least not without a proper reason.

  
“Listen to your father, Eren, and eat. This is not the time to be talking about things like that.” And that was it. No more words were allowed. But this just made Eren the more curious. He would definitely read that diary and find out why Levi did what he did. He ate up, listened a little to his father’s story before he excused himself to go upstairs. Spending the day at the pool had been exhausting. When he was sure his parents wouldn’t come in to his room, he took the book from under his pillow and started to read page one:

  
_12th July 1744_  
_I’m not much of a writer but lately this house feels as if it is necessary to pass down what is going on here to the next generations. Serving the Jäger family has always been my pride but what has been happening ever since Mrs. Jäger had announced her pregnancy makes me highly suspicious. Kenny, my uncle, stopped talking to me all of a sudden and doesn’t inform me anymore about the on-goings on the court._  
_My most talented disciples have been taken away from me, just Hanji is still around._ _She refused to follow my uncle’s orders but unfortunately, she doesn’t know either what was going on. All she knows is that it had to do with the baby that was about to be born. Since Mrs. Jäger is already in her last Trimester, it won’t be long until we will find out what the matter is. Anyway, as for now, all we can do is watch and hope to find out what is happening in the castle._

  
Eren stopped reading. What castle? He thought that they had lived here in this house all the time. Had the Jäger family been wealthier than he had known? At least in the past this was possible since no one ever bothered to tell him any details. Maybe reading diaries wasn’t too bad of an idea.

  
_As for now, I shall rest and try to find out more about what is happening around here._

And this is where the page ended. When he flipped the page to read the next entry, he was confused. The book was empty. The pages after that were also empty. Why would anyone keep a diary with only one entry. One, that didn’t even give much information. A little frustrated he put the book aside and turned off the light. He let himself fall into his bed and stared at the ceiling. Well, at least, if what the diary said was true, Levi wasn’t the bad one. Or, at least, not without a reason. Did his parents know about this? Do they know why Levi had tried to burn the library down? He could only guess. But he wanted to go to the history section of their library and look through the books. Through personal books and books that referred to the family and the town’s history. He wanted to know what had happened back then in 1744.

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

“Say, Armin,” Eren took a bite from the sandwich his mother had prepared for him. “Just hypothetically speaking, what if the ‘truth’ you always took for granted was suddenly nothing but a lie – what would you do?” the two boys were sitting in their school’s hallway eating their lunch. Eren had woken up to the thought of Levi’s diary. Why was there only one page? And why did he say that strange things were happening around him?

“I wonder. I guess it depends on the situation. I mean, we all survived after we found out that santa claus was made up by a big softdrink company, right?” he said, unwrapping his sandwich.

“Wait, what? You say santa doesn’t exist?” Eren was shocked. Or at least he pretended to be for a second before they both laughed at this lame joke.

“Like, my mother had always told me that Levi Ackermann was a bad human and I should never bother with him,” he started, not even sure what he was supposed to tell Armin now. “But I found his diary yesterday and it doesn’t feel as if he- hey, Armin, are you okay?” his friend suddenly started to choke on his bread, interrupting Eren.

“I’m sorry,” he coughed, “I’m fine now. Hey, Jean told me they had ice cream in the cafeteria today. Want to get some?” before Eren got the chance to reply, Armin had already gotten up and was fixing his pants before putting his sandwich back into his bag. “Yeah… yeah sure,” Eren said before he followed his friend to the cafeteria.

 

Back home, Eren wanted to look at the diary again. He didn’t know what he was hoping to find but he wouldn’t know if he didn't start to look for it. He picked up the book and let himself fall into his bed, opening page one to read through it again. What could this strange behavior mean? Maybe he should look that up.

He got up from his bed and took a last look at the date Levi had written down.  _12 th July 1744_. Eren grinned. Today was the July 13th, maybe it was just a prank his father played him? Well, whatever it was, it gave him a chance to go through the books in the library.

The smell of old books found its way to his nose and he automatically relaxed. There was nothing that could compare to the smell of hundreds, no, even thousands of books. This time he skipped the sciences section and went straight to the history books. He found the part about his family’s and the town’s history and chose some of the more general books in hope to get a hint at what had happened back then. Obviously, there weren’t that many on the time focusing on their little town. If they did, it was more related to other things that had happened in this century like the French Revolution or America. Luckily, he found not only 2 books that covered the fire, but also a book that collected all newspaper articles about that fire. He wondered who did that but then realized that the Jäger-library has always been important so it shouldn’t be too surprising that someone wanted to collect all the information. Unfortunately, he only found one book that covered Levi by more than just the name. Nevertheless, having one book was better than none.

 He sat down with what he had found and started with the newspaper articles. The fire had occurred on August 21st and burned down about a third of the library. Luckily, no important books were lost in that incident. The culprit, Levi Ackermann, didn’t try to escape and confessed what he had done right away but gave no explanation, why he would commit such a crime to a family that had always been good to him. An article from one week later stated that Levi had been beheaded three days after.

Eren thought about the diary. Levi had said that he thought the reason why suddenly people were acting strange was due to the Lady’s pregnancy who was in her last Trimester in July. What if the fire was related to the pregnancy? But in what world would that make any sense?

He opened the book about the town’s history, only to read what he had just learned from his first hand source. A little discouraged, he sorted the books back to the shelf and went back to his room, hearing his mother humming in the kitchen. He grabbed the diary before he let himself fall on his soft bed and looked at its book cover. It looked brand new and expensive. How was a mere servant able to afford a book like this, let alone any cover should’ve been out of his league. Was this what has been bothering him so much? On top of that, it was red. A red book cover in the 18th century almost screamed that it couldn’t be afforded by anyone. He opened the book again to look at the ink. At least that one looked normal to him but the way Levi wrote the letters also looked stunningly neat and perfect. He flipped the page to take a closer look at the paper when he suddenly dropped the book and shut out a little scream. _Why was there suddenly something written on it?_ He grabbed the book again and opened it on page two. There was a new entry. And he was sure as hell that there had been no entry yesterday. He placed the book under his pillow and ran downstairs to the kitchen.

“Mom, did you or anyone go inside my room?” he asked, looking at his confused mother’s face. “Well, except for me who made your bed and collected your dirty socks and underwear from the floor, no, I don’t think anyone went inside your room.”

Okay, now he was scared. “Are you sure that my father didn’t go inside? Where is he anyway?”

“Your father left for work today at 6, I made him breakfast so I’m quite sure he didn’t go there. Why are you asking anyway? Did something get stolen?” The Jäger’s happened to have some problems with thieves in the past. Thanks to their long history, they owned a lot of very rare and important books. Ever since, people tried to steal their Gutenberg Bible from them but of course, they wouldn’t keep such a book in their private library with a standard safety system. Instead, they gave it to a museum that properly secured the book for them.

“No, nothing got stolen,” he murmured to himself as he turned around to return to his room. He grabbed the diary and opened it on page two again.

 

_13 th July 1744_

_I tried to follow my uncle at night, but unfortunately, I lost him. He had left his chamber some time after dinner had ended. I can’t tell where he intended to go, so all I can do for now is to wait for him to return._

_Anyway, as for my underlings, Petra and Auruo have sided with me. What side, though. At least they agreed with me that something felt strange and people suddenly started to avoid each other, but can’t tell why. The Lady doesn’t seem to have changed, neither does the Lord. Since the soon-to-be-born baby will probably never inherit any important position, I really don’t know what could be so important about this baby that the whole castle is freaking out. At tomorrow’s council board, I will hopefully gather new information on this topic._

 

And this is where the new entry ended. Just to make sure he was not insane, he checked the next page to see it was empty. Maybe he had missed today’s page?

He read through it again and suddenly realized that Levi would attend the council tomorrow. How would a servant attend a council meeting? Even if he was there to serve them, he’d probably wait outside until someone called him or was he mistaken on that one? He sighed. It was a sigh out of pure frustration. He couldn’t exactly tell why, but he never believed that Levi would have done such a thing for no reason.

Even though he felt a little weird just taking it into consideration, but what if there was a new page tomorrow? He didn’t know how this was supposed to happen but he’d sure find out. He placed the book in his bag, which he would bring with him to school tomorrow. If his parent’s weren’t involved in a joke, he’d find a new page in the book. And if he did, he’d completely freak out.

 

**Author's Note:**

> If anyone is interested in becoming my beta for this fic, I'd be glad if you pm me :)


End file.
